Wit’s End

“He won’t bother us for awhile,” They tell each other. “I
just put him on the Dark Dream.” They drink together,
shoot very very synthetic drugs into skin or blood, run
incredible electronic waveforms into Their skulls, directly
into the brainstem, and backhand each other, playfully,
with openmouth laugh–you know, don’t you–is in those
ageless eyes…they speak of taking So-and-So and “putting
him on the Dream.” They use the phrase for each other too,
in sterile tenderness, when bad news is passed, at the annual
Roasts, when the endless mindgaming catches a colleague
unprepared–“Boy, did we put him on the Dream.”